Remember back in the late eighties when baby Jessica fell down the well… and a massive search and rescue party spent days or maybe even weeks trying to get her out? (Yes, I came from one of those mainstream households where the sun rose and set by the light of the television profusely spewing news, and we were all (pathetically) “abreast” of what THEY prescribed we should be…. Talk about a past life within a life.) Anyway, I was just jogging through the woods (for the third time in the two years Serena has been with me), and I realized that I too, have lost my Best Friend down a cruel, dark well. Except nobody sent a search and rescue party for my darling, linguistically portrayed dimension of Athena Grace. Frown.
October first was the date I posted my last blog entry in here Athena Graceland. Today is December first. For all you math retards out there, that’s TWO WHOPPING MONTHS. Ask me if that’s “OK”… Ummm, nope. It’s really not. In a way, this free-wheeling, journal-esque blog seems frivolous. But peel back the cheap plastic wrap of seeming, and you’ll see that I am here making love to myself. I am here realizing my Existence. Befriending myself in a way that is healing and even essential.
This morning, Serena is with her beloved, stand-in-grandma-friend for two massive/fleeting hours…. and it’s a rare and hella sacred interlude, where I do not have to be a survival driven hussla, shackled to making a dirty buck. Two holy hours. And a gentle, humming desperation as I deliberated on how to spend them. But I’ll tell you ONE thing– there’s nothing like being the single mom of a two year old to spur a bitch to master time management! So I opted to jog through the cool, marmalade sunlit forest, and then, yerba mate in hand, slowly explode on this ecstatically empty page. Although now, it is ecstatically filling with gorgeous fluidity and understated pleasure.
Actually, this is the happiest mOMent of my life. And just for the record, I WAS gonna write my “article”… for Rebel Priestess Magazine…. about alternative parenting. It will be about my journey as a single mama. Entitled, “From Victim to Victory”… I will brazenly share about how goddamn seductive it is to feign victimhood as a single mom… It’s like this dumb card that I get to ostentatiously wave around at the world… so that the masses will take pity on me for all that I have to do by my poor, withered and wasted self. A masturbatory stigma…. that somehow makes me feel…. like somebody, I guess.
But then…. all I have to do is flip a switch in my mind…. turn on a little “mood lighting” inside my psychedelically persuaded perceptions…. And suddenly my identity flips on her brilliant head. Like the hottest magic, I am empowered, abundant, triumphant, resourced. The truth is, without Serena, I would be aimlessly wandering the slums of Graceland. And with a man up in the mix, I would be dependent and disempowered, perpetually choking myself on the short, cruel leash, as I devoured rotten scraps from his fat, sweaty palm. (C’mon, just let me indulge in superlative drama!!! This is MY DAY.) The journey into single motherhood has demanded that I dig fuckin DEEP and claim my power in a way I never would have, had I had a partner holding my helpless little hand. That’s not to say I don’t want a partner. I do. And I will have one. Serena’s dad. He’s *finally* separating from his wife. For real. We will be together in a year. But I need(ed) this initiation before I was ready to board the Partner-Ship and cruise the cosmos, family style. Because of this rigorous initiation, I will do it from true sovereignty. Not from need. Not from ancestrally informed autopilot. I am nobody’s bitch, Bitches!!!!!
Whoa. I didn’t know I was gonna write all that. What I was intending to say, is that I was planning to invest my few, fleeting moments of Me Time writing said article. For which I’d feel so damn important. Like, “Look at me! I’m sooo cool… I know what the hell I’m talking about and I write ARTICLES.” The notion of being “Important” makes me salivate, honestly. And it cracks me up at the same time. But as I was jogging through the forest, breathing heavy and carving through forsaken layers of my own mostly delicious thoughts, I realized that blogging is how I befriend myself. And at once, I knew that this was way more crucial than being “Important”. At least for today…
Day after day, as I pour my whole self into raising Serena alone, I feel mostly crushed by the excruciating weight of my dreams. Yes, people, FINALLY, at the age of thirty seven and eleven months, my Dharma, my Destiny, my Dreams are coming into crisp, lucid focus! But the irony, is that I could contain the amount of spare time I have in a crystal thimble! Every day, I aim to move forward and get my women’s circles way the fuck OUT into the world– clarify my Vision statement, work on my website, write relevant articles and blog posts…. But mostly I FAIL!!!!!! Mostly my life revolves around an artistic weave of bacon scavenging and meeting Serena’s gorgeous needs, which I should NOT be whining about. She is a fountain of joy-full, creative, awe-struck, unfiltered Existence!!!! But sans adequate self-care (a concept I once upon a time took frivolous delight in snubbing and snarking at….), I find myself all too often, a depleted pile of anxiety, anger and sprawling frustration.
I mean it would seem “logical” that maaaaybe if I can’t even do an uninterrupted half-a-blessed-hour of yoga, take a hot bath or WRITE A FRIGGIN BLOG, that it might be INSANE to believe that I can take over the world and generate a prolific culture of empowered, deliciously embodied women leaders who stand up together in authenticity, vulnerability, unleashed and spiritually aligned Desire…. and collectively call forth a fucking fabulous, harmonious, peaceful, turned-ON, co-creative world. Yeah. Mostly it feels like trying to slay a dragon with a toothpick. Dumb, right? WRONG. Because I’m gonna slay the flame-breathing beast. I am. And then I’ll stand atop the mountain, gloriously penetrating the heavens with my blood-stained toothpick…. and rightfully feeling like a badass Master of the Yoniverse.
And then I’ll take a decadent bow, and keep right on dreaming and doing in the name of LOVE.
Athena Graceland 